Bermuda is much better prepared for Humberto than the Bahamas

Hurricane Humberto is headed towards the tiny island nation of Bermuda -- but they are starting from a much better place.

Hurricane Dorian devastated the Bahamas two weeks ago, and the destruction still looks much the same:

Homes lay in ruins one week after Hurricane Dorian hit The Mudd neighborhood, in the Marsh Harbor area of Abaco, Bahamas, Monday, Sept. 9, 2019.

Fernando Llano/AP

Now Hurricane Humberto is headed straight towards Bermuda. Will it suffer the same fate?

Hurricane Humberto Sept. 16 at 6:30 p.m. ET, via NOAA/CIRA

You can find our latest forecast story at the link above, but I am confident it will not. For one thing, Hurricane Humberto is weaker, only expected to be a Category 2 storm at landfall; Dorian was a 5. Humberto is also moving quickly, whereas Dorian stalled over the Bahamas.

But perhaps most importantly, Bermuda, although it boasts a top elevation of only 249 feet (compared to 207 feet in the Bahamas), has a much larger percentage of its land safely above a storm surge like Dorian brought. The map below shows a stark difference between normal conditions and an 8-meter (24-foot) storm surge in both countries:

Bermuda, normal conditions and those during an 8-meter rise in the ocean's surface.

The Bahamas, normal conditions and those during an 8-meter rise in the ocean's surface.

The Bahamas practically disappear with that surge, which is why most of those northern islands were underwater during Hurricane Dorian.

Bermuda also has strict building codes for homes and shelters, which the Bahamas do not have. Most buildings in Bermuda are made of stone, not wood, and are built to take a Category 2 hurricane. Shelters are even more resilient.

Only four people have been killed by hurricanes in Bermuda -- all of those during Hurricane Fabian in 2003, one of three major hurricanes to pass within 100 nautical miles of Bermuda since 1950.